Sulpicia was sitting on a bench just outside the door. Vitellius held her close. I nodded, and he plucked at me, agitated.
“Arcturus-give Sulpicia something for her nerves, will you? She hasn’t stopped shaking.”
Didn’t sound like the Sulpicia every man in Aquae Sulis knew. Her face burned a bright red beneath the makeup. A mask, and not one of the happy ones. Her entire body was shaking and twitching hard enough to make her blurry. She wasn’t watching me. She wasn’t watching anybody.
I put up a hand to her forehead. It was on fire. “Sulpicia-can you talk?”
Her eyes roved over mine, huge and black. I bent her head back and forced open her mouth. Octavio watched me, impatient, knowing enough to keep his own mouth shut.
No saliva. Her fingers fluttered near her face like baby sparrows, making an intricate pattern of nothing. She fell forward suddenly, hands to stomach.
I shoved her head back against the wall. Vitellius yelped. No goddamn time, and not much hope.
I jammed my fingers down her throat and counted to five. Tried again. This time the reflex kicked in. She started retching, couldn’t feel it. I forced her head down between her knees. C’mon, Sulpicia. Your stomach muscles are tight enough.
It came up a gush, and Vitellius jumped back. Measure of his devotion. I repeated the process until her stomach was empty and my hands and tunic were stained with rust-colored vomit.
The boyfriend was squealing. I checked her pulse. Slowing. Normal color coming back. She probably wouldn’t die today.
His squeal got louder. “She drank poison. Give her simple broth and wine with a lot of water.” A fly buzzed dangerously close to his open mouth. “Go. Get her out of here.”
She was starting to moan a little. At least she’d had practice. He made her lean on him, and they half fell, half dragged their way to the square. The gaggle of onlookers waddled out of their way.
Octavio’s face corroded around the edges like a rusty pipe. “You know, Arcturus-you may have just killed Materna. Philo needed you right away. Sulpicia was probably just drunk or someth-”
“Either you’re a fraud or an idiot. If Materna’s unconscious, she’s gone. You said so yourself. I can’t raise the dead. That was Faro’s job, remember?”
I took a step toward him. His fingers curled into tight little red balls at his sides.
“Sulpicia was poisoned-probably by the same stuff that’s killing Materna-and I don’t make decisions about who lives and dies around here. Do you?”
We glared at each other, his chest puffing with exertion, the sweat still dripping on the pavement. Materna was dying. They were already lining up the evidence.
The baths were loud in desertion, like an empty theater. I washed my hands in the overflow pipe while Octavio breathed on my elbow. He belonged here, like mildew, and was just as hard to get rid of.
He motioned with his head toward the apodyterium. Materna was on the floor, her body oozing over the stone as if it were already dead. Maybe it always was.
Philo was bent over her mouth, listening to her breathe. “Arcturus-thank God you’re here. I don’t have much experience with this sort of thing. I think she’s been poisoned. It’s not aconitum.”
His handsome face was flushed and worried. I looked down at the woman who wanted to kill my wife and me.
“How long has she been unconscious?”
“About half an hour, I think. They sent for me as soon as she collapsed.”
“Did you make her vomit?”
“I tried. She couldn’t do it. She’s in very deep.”
I stared at Materna’s pulpy body, her massive chest climbing like a weary traveler, then descending slowly, waiting for the trip to end. Her body was heavy and fat, but not with food or wine. She fed off a diet of power, spiced with the occasional life.
A small breeze from the exercise yard nudged me in the back, and I knelt down next to Philo. Pulled open her eyes. The pupils swallowed everything. Humanity had been devoured a long time ago. The darkness was still hungry, and it was waiting for Materna.
Her lips were dry, pressed in a skeleton’s smile against yellow teeth. Skin the color of parchment, and as hot as a blister full of pus.
I looked up at Philo. “She’s not going to make it.”
A sob swelled from the corner. Secunda was slumped on the stone bench, blending in with the rock. Philo stood up, his knees creaking. He wavered there, not sure if he should try to comfort Secunda or wait for a more specific diagnosis.
Octavio crawled back into the room, wanting to make sure we knew he was still in charge. He flicked a glance at Philo and let the weight of his authority drop on me.
“What is it?”
I waited to hear what Philo would say. He looked at me with a dog’s eyes, and when I stared blandly back, my eyebrows raised, he made it sound like a suggestion.
“I think-strychnos?”
He whispered it, but it was loud enough to solicit another sob from the corner. I ignored Secunda. She could trot out the devoted daughter act on someone else’s time. I didn’t bother to keep my voice down.
“More than a maybe. And yes, Octavio, to your next question. It was murder. Sometimes people eat a few berries so they can have visions, but Materna would never do that. She’d be too afraid of what she might see.”
The gasp in the corner was hard to ignore. Secunda stood up, her hand to her throat. “She saw Faro-before-before…”
“Before she fell asleep.” Trust Philo to make it sound like a goddamn bedtime story.
Secunda nodded, her eyes swelling with tears. I walked over to her.
“What did she see?”
She stared ahead of us and through the archway, where the shadows from the palaestra drew shapes on the floor. “She saw him-talked to him-”
“What did she say?”
“Arcturus, do you think you should…” Philo, always so protective of women.
“What did she say?”
“She said-she said-‘Faro-I’m sorry. Forgive me, my love.’ ”
Secunda had read one too many cheap Greek novels.
“What did your mother really say, Secunda?”
She broke off her trance, looked at me for the first time. Recognition, and a little of the old family spite. “You. How do you know? You probably killed her. I heard-I heard you tell her how you would, that morning when you-when you hit poor Faro.”
She crowed it like a wedding announcement. Octavio’s footsteps made a happy sound when they trotted up to me.
“Arcturus-” He was using his formal voice.
“Not just yet, Octavio. Why isn’t Papirius here? He likes to be present whenever I’m accused of something.”
He drew his robes together, pretending they weren’t too damp and dirty and cheap to make an impression. “He’s coming. He knows you’re here.”
“What a relief. I wouldn’t want him to miss the show.”
I turned back to Secunda, her eyes little slits of suspicion and malice. “Let’s have the truth. From the beginning.”
“I’ve told you-and you-you’re a-”
“I’m lots of things. Murderer isn’t one of them. Besides, neither you nor anyone else will shed any tears for Materna. If you’re not careful, Secunda-very careful-you’ll wind up just like her.”
Her pink lips drew back in a snarl. Any prettiness she owned because of youth was rapidly aging. She turned to Octavio. “You let him stand there and threaten me? You heard him-he threatened to kill me, just like-”
Before I could tell her to shut her goddamn mouth, Philo put his hands on her shoulders. Maybe I wasn’t the best person to get it out of her. He made soothing noises. She looked at him like most women did.
An officious throat clearing announced Papirius, followed by one of his ubiquitous slaves. He avoided looking at me. Octavio bent low, spine surprisingly mobile. But then maybe he didn’t have one.
“Papirius. They say it’s murder. Poison again. Strychnos.”